She went to the window and began looking into the street. Judging by the time, he might be back now. But her calculations might be wrong, and she began once more to recall when he had started and to count the minutes.

At the moment when she had moved away to the big clock to compare it with her watch, someone drove up. Glancing out of the window, she saw his carriage. But no one came upstairs, and voices could be heard below. It was the messenger who had come back in the carriage. She went down to him.

“We didn’t catch the count. The count had driven off on the lower city road.”

“What do you say? What!...” she said to the rosy, good-humored Mihail, as he handed her back her note.

“Why, then, he has never received it!”